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People have always been impressed with my digital colouring and I've wanted to create a book on how I colour my character art since my last year at uni back in 2007. Finally in 2013 I asked the Publisher of my previous titles if they'd be willing to work on such a project. It got the go ahead, but the idea was slightly altered to make it work. I was so keen to see it out there that I was happy to compromise here and there by dropping a section or two and adding in something else. I had originally wanted to create the page layouts also, but this ended up being assigned to an in-house designer.

The book was finished and Published August 2014 🙂

Time

It took a while to complete- the deadline on it was around 4 months to submit both the text and images. I then needed a number of weeks some time later to revise the page layouts and re-check over the edited text.

Initial planning took a few weeks. I had already created a 30 page BLAD (book layout and design) years ago, which helped speed the initial stages up and helped when pitching the idea.

Fortunately, I also already had several finished works to contribute to the book, which would have otherwise taken a good 20 hours a piece.

I worked my own hours- some days spending 15 hours solidly working, others just 4 or 5, but with 160 pages to fill up with well written, fresh content, it was never going to be a breeze. I guess all in, I must have spent a good 500 hours on it.

Effort

I wanted the book to be one of the best things I'd ever produced, so was willing to go above and beyond to get it up to scratch. Unlike my previous book TAODM, Digital Manga needed about 55% more written content and 50% more image content. I also didn't want to use a writing assistant or several image contributions from collaborators this time around so that the work would be 99% my own.

I also took it upon myself to record several of the book's character tutorials, convert them into time lapse videos, then upload them to a web page I'd created along with downloadable content.

Positives

It may not be everyone's cup of tea or it may not be the best instructional book in the world, but I'm really proud of the end result. I've checked out hundreds of online art tutorials, forums and videos over the last decade and know the book is covering all the necessary bases and more whilst drawing upon everything I've learned about Photoshop art creation since I started using it back in 2000.

I'm sure a lot of people will just buy it for the pretty pictures but I really hope people out there get the chance to read it and make use of some of the content I provided. I really want people to learn something and for the book to help with their digital art endeavours.

Problems

The book isn't as perfect as I'd like it to be. Frustratingly there were several errors left in the book. These could have been resolved before it went to print had I been given the opportunity to check out a final proof. I imagine the publishing team were up against deadlines or problems of their own and not as invested into the project, so were not as willing to get it perfect. I will do all that I can to make sure many of these get rectified should the book get reprinted.

I needed to spend a lot of time adjusting or advising upon the page layouts sent to me. There were an unacceptable amount of inconsistencies and some horrendous design choices- use of garish, clashing colours, tacky background images. I tried to think how the book would have ended up had I not insisted on overseeing the layout stages.

I don't yet know if this will be a problem or not, but I imagine sales won't reach the same levels as my previous titles. While the book is, in my opinion, totally awesome and a huge step up from the last ones, I realize Photoshop isn't as accessible to manga fans as a pencil and paper. It's not something for complete novices either and at then end of the day, the book teaches how I work, which might not be to everyone's taste.

Dealing with Publishers

Communication was done completely over email. It was great to have a record of everything sent and received and suited my late working hours.

Although there is this detachment whereby I don't know what is going on their end. Are they also frantically trying to get everything done and staying up until the early hours to do so. Or are they not taking the project as seriously, slapping together a half-arsed job and calling it a day? It can be easy to fear the worst if there is a lack of face to face communication or if there's a problem and I can't talk to the designer, the sales team, the accountant etc. directly and instead everything is going through the editor.

What's Next?

Another tutorial book perhaps? I've been asked to work on something else which has the same kinda of visual impact as Digital Manga, but nothing has been confirmed yet. I've already given my all to this book, so it's hard to know how I can top it until I can start to build up a new portfolio and back catalogue of fresh, full coloured artwork to use in a new title. Until then, I'm looking forward to producing some more artwork and moving onto the next stage of my career 🙂

An oil painting. A huge portrait of a couple that would be given to them as a gift.

The painting would have taken me about two weeks.

I quoted my hourly rate which was around $35/hr at the time.

2 weeks (80 hours) x $35/hr = $2800

If you ask me, for a huge double-portrait in fracking oil paint, 28-hundy is a legitimate steal.

But the man offering the job did not agree. In fact, he was shocked and offended. He had a much lower figure in mind…

He the offered me $25 for the portrait.

I asked him how much he got paid for his job and if it was higher than $12.50 a week.

…and that’s the end of that story.

Granted, the “$25 Portrait” example, although true, is ridiculous. No sane artist would accept that guy’s offer.

My point here is that bad clients usually look bad right from the beginning.

It’s desperation that blinds us.

It is our desperation that gives power to the bad clients.

I'd say this example represents 90+% of the job offers I've had while freelancing. Perhaps not to this extent, but similar. With the huge pool of internet artists for both companies and private individuals to choose from these days, generating the kinda money an artist deserves is no easy task.

I drew the cyberpunk ninja Bengosha a long time ago. He was originally created for a character design contest and then used as a character example in the book 'The Art of Drawing Manga'. This year I started working on a new book about digital techniques due for release in 2014 and decided to include a Bengosha revamp.

I still like a few aspects of the original, even if it is a very old piece, although I hope anyone else agrees that the new art is an improvement! I've never been an amazing artist and probably never will, but I still like to think I'm pretty good at busting out a cool picture here and there when I put in a lot of time and effort 🙂

Despite being a manga inspired/influenced/style artist, I'd imagine a large percentage of people I know don't really know what manga is, let alone understanding the differences between it an anime. I don't think the answer is a simple 'one term fits all scenarios' sentence, but I thought I'd try my best at summing it up with a little help from Wikipedia.

What is the difference between Anime and Manga?

Anime is a term to describe animation created in Japan. In the west, the term is “anime” is defined as a style and genre of animation typically originating in Japan, and can often feature detailed, colorful imagery, unique, in-depth characters and action orientated plot lines either set in the past, present, futre or often within a fantasy setting. The meaning of the term ‘anime’ can sometimes vary depending on the context it’s used in.

Manga is a term to describe comics created in Japan, or produced by Japanese Manga Ka (artists), primarily for a Japanese audience. The style was developed in Japan though the mid to late 19th century with heavy influenced from western and american comics combined with the long and complex history of Japanese art and wood-block prints. In the western world, the term is often defined as a style of drawing originating in Japan and many western artists have adopted this style and refer to themselves as Manga artists.

So we could summarize:

Anime = animation in a typical Japanese cartoon style. Often in full Colour.Manga = comics in a typical Japanese cartoon style. Often in black & white and with grey tones.

I decided to join up to Amazon Affiliates today. If you want to purchase my books, or indeed any other book through Amazon, be sure to do it via clicking on these referral links below. Many thanks for your support 🙂

I've now used it for three or four artworks over the last few months and it's working out well. I have it in a floating, elevated position for day to day use and bring it down to the desk at around a 45 degree angle for art projects (see above). I decided to program the Cintiq buttons from top to bottom (for Photoshop use) as:

Step Forward

Step Backward

x (swap foreground and background colour)

b (brush tool)

Touch strip: mostly use for brush size

Ctl

Alt

Shift

Pan/ Hand tool

These would work great for me. The trouble is I often forget to use the the Cintiq's buttons as I'm so used to keyboard keys. And while, in theory, simply having to shift my right thumb to press the buttons would potentially simplify and speed up work flow, most projects still require me to use several other useful short cut keys so often neglecting the buttons and instead sticking exclusively to the keyboard seems to make sense right now.

The screen size is good. I didn't feel I needed the extra couple of inches from the 24" version, and the lower weight from the 22 incher means the adjustable arm I use doesn't have a problem keeping it suspended off the desk. It's not cutting edge screen tech, but gives a good quality result far greater than my previous monitor set up and I have no complaints. Also glad I didn't pay the extra for the touch version as I doubt I'd make use of those features.

At the moment the pen uses a standard nib, which I'll probably change to a felt nib as I like the added friction and softer tip feel. I'm still wondering if I need to get a 'Smudge-guard' glove to reduce palm friction. So far I've not really found this to be a problem so I'll stick without and see how I get on using it over the coming year.

The Set up

My keyboard [Microsoft Wireless 6000 v3.0] sits to my left (since I'm right handed) and it's pretty comfortable to use while I rest my palm on the desk/palm rest and my elbow on my chair's arm.

I've since extended the Ergotron laptop arm so the screens don't butt up against each other or need to overlap and there's enough space under the tech to clean and dust. All cabling is concealed within the arms themselves.

My printer [Epson 1500W Stylus Photo A3+] fits nicely at the back in the corner typically covered with a custom made cover to keep dust at bay.

The Cintiq is connected to the laptop via a DVI to HDMI cable. This required opening up the back of the tablet to attach (twice, since I've since extended to cable length from 2m to 3m).

I also bought a Intuos Pen for when I take my laptop elsewhere and obviously the Cintiq has to stay at home. I've used it the Intuos once so far and liking it. I'd better start coming up with some new artworks so I can put this new tech to use.

Including some extensive chip an scuff repair, I gave my RX8 an extensive deep clean and detail which in total totted up to around 40 hours! Most of that was down to removing thousands of tiny black specks from the paintwork. Still not sure if it was tar, tree sap, break dust or carbon dust from the exhaust, but it was a time consuming pain to get rid of them all. Hopefully if I keep it regularly shampooed and waxed it's not going to need so much attention in the future.

During the start of the year I was asked to give 1-1 tuition to a talented 11 year old girl interested in bettering her anime and manga drawing skills. Although being more used to older students working solely with digital media, it worked out well. The tuition consisted of setting small projects, demonstrating, drawing together or sometimes just overseeing with the lessons shifting more towards digital as the weeks went on. Here's a compilation of some of the sketches I'd worked on during our process:Drawing heads, discussing shading, coloured pencils, inking.

It's my RX8's 5th birthday in a couple of months time and decided to make it a little prettier by fixing dozens of chips, scuffs and giving it a thorough clean [in progress].

This is one of the more noticeable bodywork scuffs. I fixed up around 30-35 other small chips.

Repaired using the Chipex system. An ok result.

After adding some primer with a brush and a bottle of touch up paint off of eBay for £6 for the wheels, I used some of the Chipex blending solution to help level it out.

These were pretty badly curbed in places so needed a little sanding before repainting. These photos are taken after sanding and priming with the primer filling in some of the curbing gaps.

I'd say these repairs are only 85% perfect, but to professionally recondition and spray the wheels alone might set me back £200-£300 so more than adequate for an interim fix up job and perhaps have them fully restored to perfection by a pro in a few years time.